BBC Music Magazine
Chamber Disc of the Month: 'The Retrospect Trio speak the language of Purcell as if it was their mother tongue.'
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allmusic.com
'The ensemble's sound is exquisite, and the pair of violinists and the basso continuo of bass viol and harpsichord or organ produce a vibrant blend that gleams with authentic period sonorities and ornamentation.'
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Purcell: Ten Sonatas in Three Parts - International Record Review

01 October 2011International Record ReviewMarc Rochester

It was a tired joke of my music history lecturer back in the
1970s that trio sonatas were performed by just about any number of people
except three; organists regard them as solo compositions while chamber
musicians assume at least four people will be involved. Irrespective of the numbers actually playing,
what matters is the balancing of the upper two voices and the harmonic and
rhythmic stability of the lower one, whether is the organ pedals or, as here, a
keyboard instrument and a bass viol. If
there were the only factors to be considered, then these four members of the Retrospect
Trio (and how my old music history lecturer would have chortled at that
anomaly) have got it absolutely right.
As an exhibition of the technique of trio sonata playing, this is about
as good as it gets, and Linn's delicately refined recording casts this instinctively
balanced playing in a lovely light.

There is, of course, much more to it than that, and as these
same four players showed in their earlier debut disc of the posthumously
published Ten Sonatas in Four Parts (reviewed in July/August 2009), they have a
strong affinity with the distinct idiom of Purcell's instrumental music. They relish those tantalizing dissonances,
those exquisite false relations and all the ingenious harmonic twists and
turns, never overplaying their hand but making sure we don't miss a single one
of Purcell's tricks.

In this set of 12 Sonatas in Three Parts, published with an
introductory essay by Purcell in 1683, the music is frequently harmonically
adventurous and ever willing to explore the effects of crunching clashes of
notes. The Retrospect Trio gleefully
reveals these elements with a naturalness which is all the more vivid for being
unforced, the witty C major Sonata perhaps the most unaffectedly enjoyable one
on the whole disc.

Matthew Halls provides a thoroughly researched and eminently
readable booklet note which draws attention to the very international language
Purcell adopted, with the English court's love of (just about) all things
French spicing up characteristically English writing, while an influx of
Italian violinists added another dimension to the musical vocabulary. It was these Italians, Halls tells us, who
brought violin virtuosity to England, and Sophie Gent and Matthew Truscott,
both among the finest Baroque violinists of our own time, display it with
tremendous verve, nowhere more so than in the sprightly fugal writing which
constitutes the fourth of the five movements of the G minor Sonata. Immediately afterwards this Sonata heads into
an archetypically English and utterly Purcellian chaconne, as if to emphazise
the international credentials of the music.
There are some distinctly English dance movements - as in the closing Allegro of the B flat major Sonata - and
even a hint of the French Overture
style in the first movement of the F major Sonata, but all are presented with a
convincing feel for the idiom and a wholly captivating sense of overall
architecture which gives the entire disc a far more coherent feel than its
listing of 61 individual tracks - only one exceeding two minutes in length -
might imply.

The bass viol is often here far more than a mere continuo
instrument - Halls suggests that it was the influx of foreign publications
which prompted Purcell to prepare his second set of Sonatas with separate part
books for both bass viol and keyboard - and playing on a 1712 Barak Norman
instrument, Jonathan Manson elevates the instrument to a position where in
places it becomes the complete equal of the violins (as in the closing Allegro of the F major Sonata). Supporting everything and helping the music
to unfold with utter stylishness, Halls himself alternates freely between a
Kenneth Tickell chamber organ and a copy of a Grimaldi harpsichord by mark
Ducornet.

All four musicians and their instruments combine to complete
a survey of Purcell's three- or four-part sonatas which is not only authoritative
but unfailingly enjoyable. This is an
utterly delightful disc.